A strange choice for a nightmare movie? Perhaps not. Go all the way back to Hitchcock's Lifeboat, as mentioned in the very first film discussed here, Night of the Living Dead, and this is perhaps the logical point we've reached. Yes, it is horrific, but most horror fans wouldn't place it in the genre. Is it a 'nightmare movie' as defined at the start? Yes, without a shadow of a doubt. Paul Greengrass, a notable director of horrific high tension (just watch Flight 93 for that) here outdoes himself in a film which starts 'big' (on a huge container ship) and ends small (in the ships lifeboat). Indeed, the smaller the film gets, the more unbearable it feels. Captain Richard Phillips is seen packing his bags before being driven to the airport by his wife (Catherine Keener) to captain a container ship from Oman that must traverse the waters off Somalia. In the car ride, Phillips is worried about his children and Andrea is worried about his job. From there, we cut to Somalia as local mercenaries appear in a village and threaten the locals into further pirating. Muse (Barkhad Abdi) picks his team and they go in search of something big. They find the container ship and, after an aborted attempt, finally board the vessel and, after searching the ship, Muse and his gang kidnap Captain Phillips in the lifeboat before the military is called. Details and moments from almost any of the past nineteen films can be found here. Concerns about children and how they dictate our lives, fear of the unknown environments and people we encounter, horrific violence, detailed antagonists, tightly wound tension. All here. Horror as a genre is about putting us in horrific places and questioning how we would react. In the final scene as Phillips, similar to Texas Chainsaw Massacre's Sally, breaks down, our heart breaks as we realise the true nightmare is how he will build his life back together after the violent events he has just encountered. From Night of the Living Dead to Captain Phillips, the nightmare movie is obviously more encompassing than the horror film but make no mistake, they are two sides of the same coin. Indeed, the refrain 'I'm coming to get you' from the start of Night of Living Dead is a refrain that goes through all of these films, from Jon Voigt staring down the arrow shaft in Deliverance, Terry O'Quinn looking across at his daughter in the basement in The Stepfather right through to the moment when Captain Phillips and Muse look at each other through their binoculars one mile apart on the high seas. There is always someone behind you...
